


Loathing

by bonzai_bunny



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Other, Pedophilia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-01
Updated: 2013-08-01
Packaged: 2017-12-22 01:48:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/907448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bonzai_bunny/pseuds/bonzai_bunny
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Howard knew he was a monster long before he ever sought out a wife. Even without his illness, it came with his job description.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Loathing

**Author's Note:**

> This is for a really really really old kink meme prompt that asked for pedophile!Howard struggling with Tony's existence. I put implied/referenced non-con in the tags because Howard dreams about it vaguely, but it doesn't actually happen.

Howard knew he was a monster long before he ever sought out a wife. Even without his illness, it came with his job description. He was a destroyer of worlds, he had a lot of blood on his hands and he had hoped this alone would be a good enough reason as to why he didn’t get married. He was a busy man, he worked a lot, he often worked with dangerous, unstable materials, and lot of people wanted him dead. But nonetheless, people started to _talk_ and when people did that share-holders started to listen.

Obadiah had pulled him aside one day. First, he asked if Howard was homosexual to which Howard had incredulously denied. Then, seeming like he didn’t buy that at all, suggested that Howard find a girl and settle down. Howard would have told him to fuck off, but he realized the warning. No matter how many excuses Howard told others why he shouldn’t get married it seemed odd that at his age and with his wealth that he was still single.

Obi set him up on a date with Maria Carbonell. She was beautiful and intelligent and old enough that he assumed she wouldn’t want kids. She also came from money so Howard didn’t have to worry about her simply wanting his fortune. They got married eight months after their first date. Howard could almost trick himself into thinking he really enjoyed having sex with her; he could almost imagine that he wasn’t sick. And then a year after they got married, she told him she was pregnant and everything good in Howard’s life crumbled.

At first he didn’t believe her. He had been religious in his condom usage, because having a child was the absolute worst thing he could imagine, but apparently accidents happen. He wanted to tell her to get rid of it, but he had no legitimate excuse other than the one he had been giving people for years as to why he didn’t have kids.

( _“I’m just not good with children.”_ )

Of course that wasn’t the real problem, but he didn’t like to admit the truth to himself, and nine months later Maria gave birth to a beautiful healthy boy. Howard was afraid of holding him. He played it off that he just didn’t want to accidentally hurt the baby (Anthony, he had to remind himself, the baby’s name was Anthony), but truthfully he was afraid he was going to mess this child up. Inevitably he was going to get older and it would be more and more difficult for Howard to stop himself from ruining this tiny person. He would try his best to avoid the other to not leave a nasty mark on him.

The problem was Tony was brilliant. He was two years old when Howard and Maria helped him learn his alphabet and numbers and some simple math. Howard wanted to be proud but he also knew that the more his son grew attached to him, the harder it would be to pull away. He told Maria they should let tutors take care of his education until he was old enough for school and she reluctantly agreed.

The problem was Tony was beautiful. The older he became the more Howard ached for him. Despite Howard’s best efforts, Tony grew attached. He wanted to know what Howard was building, how he did what he did. For some unfathomable reason he looked up to Howard. He often followed Howard into his lab and worked on projects (things that he would beam at if Howard paid any attention to them) until Howard forbid it when he was six. He chased Tony away with cruel words because Tony being there was frustrating and _distracting_ and maybe if Tony stayed out of his workspace he could get a little work done.

( _“Damn it, Tony, would you just stay out of my way? I don’t have time for your nonsense.”_

_“Yes sir.”_ )

But it wasn’t enough. He couldn’t avoid Tony forever no matter how hard he tried. The boy tried Howard’s will and the summer was the absolute worse. Not only was he around the house all day, but he wore these shorts and t-shirts and when Howard looked at him, he shuddered, because all he saw was skin. He was afraid to even touch his son, even innocuous touches like a pat on the shoulder, because he was certain he wouldn’t be able to stop himself from touching more.

On summer days like those, Howard often locked himself in his lab and just drank himself to a stupor. He didn’t have to deal with anything that way and it was much more peaceful to just drink and drink and drink. Only the worst thing was, even when he did drink, he often had terrible dreams about him defiling Tony the way his body urged him too and his mind didn’t even give him the benefit of Tony coming quietly. He always shoved his hand over Tony’s mouth to muffle his son’s screams and when Howard woke up, shaking, he often stumbled to his bathroom to empty the contents of his stomach in his toilet.

He was so disgusted with himself he couldn’t look at the mirror. He didn’t want to see that monster staring back at him.

( _“You’re a dirty old man, Howard,” he’d say bitterly when he did have to look at himself. His sunken, dark eyes were never smiling back._ )

It was the final straw. So he sent Tony to boarding school at the age of seven, but even then the urges didn’t go away. Maria seemed suspicious, but he was certain that she didn’t know. She couldn’t know. They didn’t even sleep in the same bed anymore as the reality that Howard was a shit husband and a shit father slowly sank in. It was a shame, because Howard really did like her, but he was grateful that she didn’t know what was truly wrong about him.

It was almost easy to function when Tony was no longer there. He could run his business, he could design weapons. He could continue the development of S.H.E.I.L.D. Except every now and then, he’d run across something in the mansion that made him think of Tony and he’d want to cave with desire. Sometimes the temptation was too much to bear. He was alone and once, against his better judgment, he found himself in Tony’s room. It had been cleaned regularly since Tony left and it looked like an odd conglomeration of a little boy’s room and an adult’s room. Howard had never been in there before, for obvious reasons.

Howard didn’t really know why he was there. He sat down on Tony’s bed. He roamed his hands across the comforter and he could picture it: his son curled up underneath it, his chest rising and falling with each breath. Howard let his mind wander to that place he normally didn’t let it and he felt himself harden. It was a bad idea, a very bad idea. He could get caught and there was no explaining this. But still.

He unzipped his trousers and quickly got to work. He rarely ever indulged like this, but the temptation was too much when he could picture Tony so clearly. The lust erased all rational thought from his mind, so much so that it wasn’t until he was close that he realized he would have to come somewhere that wouldn’t leave a stain in his son’s room. Panicked, he reached into a drawer in front of him and grabbed the first thing his hand came in contact with. He figured he could destroy it later and replace it if he had to.

When Howard realized what he had grabbed, he felt his arousal throb. It was a pair of underwear. Completely innocuous on its own: plain and white, but it represented so much more in Howard’s sickest fantasies. He knew he shouldn’t; he should put it back and find a sock or something, but he already was so close. He had already come so far there was no purpose to self-justify his sick needs and with a quiet gasp, he came onto the underwear.

Reason began to weed through his lust-clouded mind when the high began to disappear and he guiltily put the piece of clothing in his suit pocket. He would throw it away later, he decided.

Except that he didn’t. Somehow, they found their way to the bottom of one of Howard’s drawers, which where only ever opened by him. They would be pulled out on difficult days, days where Howard had a hard time resisting his own impulses and often days where something reminded him of Tony. It was a terrible coping method, but he assumed that nothing would come from it. He was wrong, of course.

It happened on an otherwise unremarkable morning. Howard was having a brief breakfast before he went into the office—Jarvis was cleaning up the mess from cooking—when Maria stormed in, which was unusual because she didn’t normally wake until ten, long after Howard was gone.

“Jarvis, could you please give us a moment?” And there was steel in her tone, hidden beneath her polite words and Howard was briefly reminded why he had married her in the first place.

Jarvis bowed his head with a curt, “Of course, Madame,” before leaving the room. As soon as he was gone, Maria threw the crumpled up underwear that she had in her hand on the table and Howard froze.

“Where—where did you get that?” He croaked.

“You don’t get to ask the questions here. Why was his underwear in your room?”

Howard didn’t know what to say. He certainly couldn’t say the truth, but there was little else that could be possible than the truth. So he settled for guilty silence, staring down at the table oddly defeated. Maria seemed enraged.

“Howard, you’re—are you—”

“Please don’t say it,” he interrupted, already predicting where this conversation was going. “You don’t have to say it; I already know that I’m a monster.”

He chanced a glance upwards and she looked like she wanted to slap him. And that was fine he supposed; he figured he would want to slap him too.

“And Tony? Have you done anything to him?”

“ _No_ ,” He cried, hoping to convey that he was just as horrified at the thought as she was, “I’ve never…not Tony, not anyone else.”  

“You know, I thought you were having an affair,” Maria said bitterly after a moment of silence, “It was the only thing that made sense to me, but this…” She shook her head.

“I’d prefer the affair.” 

He nodded solemnly, because he understood, but then a thought occurred to him:

“Are you leaving me?”

She sighed, “No. That wouldn’t be fair to Tony. He still looks up to you, for some reason.”

Howard winced, even though she had basically expressed his own sentiments on the matter, and he admitted, “I can’t be around him. I don’t want to hurt him.”

Her eyes flashed dangerously, “I won’t let you. You’re stronger than that. You have to be.”  

He could hear the unspoken threat and nodded again. He still didn’t trust himself to be around their son though, regardless of what she said. Her shoulders slumped a little and she crossed her arms and it was apparent that she was just as exhausted as he was.

“Hey, why don’t you go somewhere nice? You know, to take a break? I hear the Alps are lovely right now. You could swing by and visit Tony.”

She raised an eyebrow, her mouth quirked into an almost-smile, “Don’t you think people will wonder why I’m taking a grand vacation all by myself?”

Howard shrugged, “I’m a busy man; people know that. And if they start talking, then fuck ‘em.”

She nodded, “I’ll think about it.”

She began to turn away and Howard felt this little tug in his gut so he called after her, voice thick, “I’m sorry, you know. For everything.”   

“I know,” she said softly, before walking away. Howard watched her go, figuring this would have to be another thing he couldn’t fix. He finished his breakfast in relative silence and would go on with the rest of his day like he always did.


End file.
